Who was the mother of the Titans?

Gaia was the mother of the Titans in Hesiod’s Theogony. She was the primordial personification of Earth and, together with Uranus, the Sky, gave birth to the first generation of Titans.

Hesiod describes Gaia as emerging after Chaos. She then produced Uranus, the mountains, and Pontus, the sea, without a consort. After Uranus became her partner, Gaia bore twelve Titans: Oceanus, Coeus, Crius, Hyperion, Iapetus, Cronus, Theia, Rhea, Themis, Mnemosyne, Phoebe, and Tethys.

Gaia remains central to the succession story. Uranus hid some of their children, including the Cyclopes and Hundred-Handers, and Gaia plotted against him. She made an adamantine sickle and gave it to Cronus, who overthrew Uranus. Later, Gaia and Uranus warned Cronus that one of his own children would replace him.

A frequent confusion is mistaking Rhea for the Titans’ mother. Rhea was a Titaness and the mother of the Olympians by Cronus, including Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Hades, Demeter, and Hestia. Gaia belongs to the older primordial generation.